Then came Monday, the long-awaited and long-dreaded start of the men's 3-meter springboard competition. After a few minutes warming up, Wilcock walked up to Armstrong, the U.S. coach as well as his personal coach. "He had tears in his eyes and said, 'I can't do this,' " Armstrong said. "Then, 15 minutes later, he came back and said, 'No, I gotta try.' "

"At first I thought it just hurt too much and I made the decision I wasn't going to dive," Wilcock said. "Then I did a few dives and I thought, 'This has been a dream of mine since I was a kid.' I guess I was off the list a couple of minutes. I had the administrators going crazy."

He was the seventh diver of 32 entered, with the top 18 moving on to the semifinals. According to credentials he's established the past two years since taking temporary leave of his studies at Brigham Young University to work full time at diving, he should have easily been one of them. Wilcock's mom and dad flew in from Utah for The Moment. So did Carrie, his girlfriend from Texas. Even his youth coach at Salt Lake Aquatics Program Diving, Doug Jamison, who has since moved to New York, came to Greece to watch his one-time protege in his shining moment.

"He is an elegant, beautiful diver," Jamison said, sitting high in the spectator section with his wife, Kelli, a former junior teammate of Wilcock's. "He was a pleasure to coach. He always had the drive and the talent; he did everything he was asked. He could make the finals here. But his back's been hurting him, and he needs his back. It's critical to hold his alignment."

On the first round of six dives, Jamison watched as Wilcock turned 2 1/2 somersaults well enough but entered the water crooked.

"He fell over," said Jamison, wincing as if in pain himself. Wilcock's score, 48.60, was lowest of the opening round. But at that, down on the diving platform, Armstrong was encouraged. "It was the best he's moved it since trials," the coach said. "I thought, 'Well, OK, maybe . . .' "

Wilcock, too, had a glimmer of hope. "My best dive since trials," he agreed.

The second dive, a 56.70, was also awful though not disastrous. But when Wilcock barely finished his third dive, scoring 38.70, his distress was painfully obvious. By his fifth dive, calling for 2 1/2 somersaults and two twists, he didn't do all the twists and got a zero. On his final dive, a backward 2 1/2 somersault, he didn't, or couldn't, push off far enough from the board and hit his foot on the way down.

"On that dive all I told him was to have a strong takeoff and be safe," Armstrong said. "That shows how little control he had over his body. The (back) muscles were just not giving him a break."

By that point, the crowd had clued in that the American's problems went beyond normal Olympic jitters. When he climbed out of the pool for the last time, it was to thunderous applause.